Also – representation discussion ahoy! – I was kind of relieved to see that Mageina is Jewish and therefore there’s a chance Ursula is. Because that makes her more similar to me – I came from Russian Jews-
And yet! Tumblr is awash with discussion today about Jewish representation, and I just wish I could say anything about it. But I can’t! I know Some Stuff re: Judaism happened in my family’s recent past and I want to know about that, too, but there’s just nobody to ask. It’s too awkward and too problematic. :(
So I may just write a fanfic about Ursula too having Nobody To Ask.
My family watched Hello Dolly on Christmas Day. “Barbra
Streisland was pretty when she was younger,” someone said. “She’s pretty
in a Jewish way,” my mum said. “You are Jewish. Half Jewish.” was the general response. “So I can say that,” said my mum.
There’s an article on the Guardian website right now about antisemitism, and it included a link to this site, which is a collection of horrible antisemitic tweets, and jokes about concentration camps, and the like.
But the awful thing is…well, my mother is Jewish. In a sense at least? I know almost nothing about
my Jewish heritage, only that my mum’s side of the family are, or…were?
My grandparent’s grandparents escaped a pogrom in Russia, my mum went
to a Jewish school, but literally no-one I know practises any sort of religion anymore…
…aaaaaand I’ve heard my mum
make concentration camp jokes. In a bitter sort of way. I swear, I
remember sort of what it was, a throwaway comment in the kitchen –
“We’re Jews, so we know how ovens work.” Something like that.
I have a feeling that should be a bigger deal. I have a feeling I really need to know exactly why
she said that. But who do I ask? My family has all these cracks in it I
don’t want to open, and I’m sure Judaism came into it at some point.
Oh, I don’t know
I was watching Make Leicester British this
evening. (Well, sort of. It was on in the background. I didn’t want to
make too big a commitment because the title annoyed me so much.) I can’t
comment on those individual people in the show, but…
…I’m so
proud of Leicester, you know. I’m always so proud of Leicester. I wasn’t
born there, but it’s sort of my adopted hometown, and the fact that it exists and
is still standing strong always wows me. So many cultures are living
side by side – I used to live on Narborough Road and in a five-minute
walk you’d take in a mosque, a bar, a Polish food shop, a Subway, shops
specifially for African people, shops specifically for Indian people –
I’ve never seen another place like it. And in the centre of town, you
have all the usual fast food restaurants (KFC, McDonalds, Burger King…),
but selling halal meat and side-to-side with Indian or Chinese or
Indonesian restaurants. And all the different religious festivals
celebrated every year with banners and decorations: Diwali, Eid,
Christmas. People wearing their traditional dress in the streets all the
time! Specific cultural hairdressers, beauty salons and bridal shops!
Over seventy languages spoken in the schools!
I know I’m white and
don’t have the nuanced view of it that other people might, and I’ve no
doubt whatsoever that plenty of pockets of racism still thrive there,
though hopefully not for much longer. But god, I love that city. The EDL
keep turning up and ‘protesting’ and smashing up halal restaurants and
all the horrible, pathetic things you’d expect from them – but I’m
pretty sure it’s because they’re scared, scared of Leicester. Good, they should be.
this is silly because if you look closely you can see that the tiger is not an actual tiger but a Beanie Baby, a popular childs toy.
is that true?
I don’t know what it says about me that I went, “Wait, that beanie baby has been retired for over a decade!” and immediately went to google to check that I was right. (I was.)
I have this vague memory from when I was very young of being in the back of the family car as it turned onto our street, and seeing all these fire engines and police cars around. Later I either heard or overheard a conversation between my parents where they said that an old man had accidentally lit himself on fire and died, because he was always cooking greasy food and then wiping his hands on his clothes, and as he never changed or cleaned his clothes eventually the grease on them caught fire and killed him.
I have no idea if that’s a true story or not and I rather hope it isn’t, but I think of it in the back of my mind every time I cook greasy food, I swear.
